


The Girlfriend Experience

by MissMaxime



Category: Good Girls (TV)
Genre: AU, Brio - Freeform, Criming it up, Escort Service, F/M, Fake/Pretend Relationship, Falling for each other in a dumb way, Fluffy Ending, Food Kink, Lingerie, Oral Sex, Original Character(s), Sex Is Fun, Sharing a Bed, Unprotected Sex, Unresolved Emotional Tension, Unresolved Romantic Tension, Vaginal Fingering, Vaginal Sex, because you know, could you call this FWB to lovers??, lets not put a label on it, meeting Rio's boss, yes they're absolute idiots yes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-05
Updated: 2020-08-05
Packaged: 2021-03-06 04:53:04
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 17,249
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25727722
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MissMaxime/pseuds/MissMaxime
Summary: “You enjoying herself?”“It’s nice.”“Nice.”She stops on the plateau of the halfway mark of the stairs, turns to look at him. “I haven’t been someone’s girlfriend in over twenty years. So, yes, it’s nice. Even if it isn’t real.”---------When Rio gets a formal invitation to his boss' estate, he's expected to bring a plus one. Since he's going to need someone to make an impression, he decides - against his better judgement - to hire a professional. It goes as well as you expect.
Relationships: Beth Boland/Rio
Comments: 30
Kudos: 499





	The Girlfriend Experience

**Author's Note:**

> Y HELLO! I've written this fic or the GGWEEK2020 (use the tag on tumblr to find all kinds of pretty GG content). I hope you all enjoy!

“You need a wifey.”

Rio looks up from his phone. “Little late notice now, isn’t it?”

Gretchen tilts her head. “Fine, get someone to be your wifey, I don’t care. You can’t show up there without a date.”

She’s been on his case about this for the past few days, and it’s not like he doesn’t understand why. He’s been invited for a week of business at his boss’ estate, along with a few other, how should he put it, high management people. And for how unconservative criminal activities may be, the players are exactly that. Mostly fortysomething men, wifed up with 1.9 kids back at home. Expecting the same from their rising associates as well.

Gretchen has an, infuriating, theory about this. That he will gain more trust with a good partner. Oh, no, that is not how she put it. An acceptable girlfriend, someone bland and smart and acceptable, to accompany him.

While he is lost in thought Gretchen sits down next to him on the lounge next to the tennis court. She sighs deeply. “Remember Monica? I took her to a few of those charity events in the winter?”

He does, stunning black woman, friendly, classy. Never saw too much of her after Gretch met Cas and had her move in with her. “Sure.”

“It’s a service,” she says, as she grabs her purse. “They do all kinds of things, it’s very professional.”

Rio just stares blankly at her. 

“And very discrete,” she adds, as she extracts a business card from her wallet. 

‘Private Angels’ Rio reads. And, really? An escort?” 

“They’ll do whatever,” Gretchen fusses. “I recommended you. You have an intake tomorrow at five, call them to confirm.”

She pats him on his knee. “Don’t think it over too much, okay. They’ll send someone suitable.”

*

It’s how he finds himself in the restaurant of a hotel he and Gretchen frequent. It’s fancy, but neutral. Perfect for doing business, and this is something like that right? He tried to pry more from Gretchen about how these things go, but she was being awfully private about it. Wouldn’t even tell him much about the procedure goes before getting called away by her firm. 

“Excuse me, Mr. Mendoza?” 

He looks up and sees, not actually a woman he was expecting. Since his only reference for this service is Gretchen’s past date Monica, he figured that was the type they’d be sending. Skinny, poise, immaculately styled – modelesque. Not-

“I’m Beth,” she smiles. 

Rio gets up from his seat. Not just because it’s more gallant, but he’d like to check out what he’s working with. He’s probably a head taller than her, even though the heels on her booties give her few extra inches. Her strawberry blonde hair falls in waves to her shoulders, and she’s looking at him expectantly with big blue eyes. He lets his eyes travel down her body, that’s pleasantly more curvaceous than he expected. 

He takes her hand and kisses her twice on the cheek, which immediately flushes her. It’s unclear if it is an act of if she’s just a little taken aback, but he likes it none the less. “Rio,” he says. 

She sits down before he has a chance to invite her to. She straightens the skirt of her flowery wrap dress before drawing her attention back to him. 

“I’m sorry I’m a bit out of breath,” she says, pouring herself some water as he sits back opposite of her. “Traffic was terrible, and I had to drop my kids of at my ex,” she takes a sip of her drink. “Sorry, you don’t want to hear about that.”

“Nah, it’s cool.” He motions a waiter over. “Got an ex and a kid, got some reference if you wanna vent.”

After they order a drink Beth extracts a clipboard – and, really, a clipboard? Is she a hundred years old?- with what he can only assume is a questionnaire. “Your lawyer already send us some of your personal information, if you could see if it all checks out?” she says, giving him the clipboard. 

“You have a pen?”

“Oh, of course,” she says, digging through her bag. Well, one of them, one's a brown shoulder bag, the other is a floral linen bag – the latter obviously deemed her workbag. When she hands him one, he can see ‘Boland Motors’ and an address printed on it, but he decides not to mention it. 

Rio goes through the paper fast, it’s mostly available information, nothing Gretchen would make a mistake at. 

The waiter returns with two menu’s, and Rio can spot Beth’s reluctance from a mile away. “I’m buying,” he says, before she can emote her protests. “You’ll do me favor. Who you gonna eat with tonight, with your babies at your ex?” And he’s assuming, obviously, he just doesn’t think she’d be working this if she were settled. 

“I don’t know. I got a good deal on some lean cuisines the other day.”

They laugh, and she takes the menu from him. Making an off remark that this place doesn’t have any prices listed and they bicker about the wine before falling into a more relaxed conversation. She goes through her list of questions while they’re in between courses. 

“I think we’re good,” she says, while tucking her clipboard into her bag. “We’ll do background check obviously.”

“For any obscure activities?”

Beth smiles. “We check with other services, making sure new clients don’t have a history of mistreating girls.”

“Makes sense.”

Beth has her crème brûlée and a coffee, Rio finishes with an espresso. Before she dives in she slides her business card to Rio. “In case you’d like to make some adjustments to your take-in. I’ll send you a copy in the morning.”

He takes the card. “Gonna fax me that, _Elizabeth_?” he smiles. 

“Could send you a carrier pigeon too, if you’d like,” she smiles back, before cracking the dessert with her spoon. 

“So, what does it cost? Four full days.”

“And nights. From what I can tell now you want someone to accompany you, you left any additional _wishes_ open. So, I’m assuming you’ll just see if that’s something you want when you’re there. Those are addition costs, they will add up with frequency, as you can guess.”

“How about 15.000 dollars?”

Elizabeth chokes on her coffee so quickly, he’s afraid she burned her lungs. Just to enhance his point he puts a stack of bills on the table. When she’s done coughing she just stares at it, sucking her bottom lip between her teeth. Her eyes dart between him and the money.

“Not enough?”

He sees her debating in her mind, her eyes moving rapidly as she nodoubtly is making some mental pro and con list. And he knows, he could also let their agency get him another Monica, but while she was fine to talk to, she was also predictably boring. Elizabeth and he seem to have a kind of ease to their conversation he could use if he’s cooped up with someone for four days straight. And she is of course, ridiculously attractive. 

“20.000.” It’s enthralling, how determined she says it. He’s curious to see whatever else is wrapped up in that coy momma-front she only barely let slip a few times tonight. 

“Deal.”

* 

She offers to drive herself, but he is not having her on payroll to drive alone for three hours. 

It’s a decision he almost immediately regrets. Apparently, Elizabeth is very convinced of her (faulty) navigation skills. And mind you, he has an essentially AI-worthy navigation system build into his (“Is this what you drive? Don’t you think it’s a little… out there? Like, surely you don’t really need something so preposterous to arrive in?” she had laughed cutely after that, but he felt slapped in the face – and not the kind he might be paying her for) G-wagon. 

“Why can’t they just tell you where we’re going?” she pouts, insulted that she cannot use her ridiculous paper maps. And again, when he’ll peel back her layers and finds just a carton cut-out basic bitch from a Knits-Are-Us catalogue he’s going to get his money back

Rio drags his hand across his face before whipping out his phone and sending the location to his (very well equipped) navigation system. “It’s a private party. We’ll see it when we get there.” He starts the car, hoping to have ended this conversation.

“It’s poor hostmanship. I had no idea what to pack.”

“Might refrain from telling the arms dealer that.”

Her eyes bulge from their sockets and he’s cautiously counting a win here. 

“Grozdan’s there?” 

“Old friend?”

She laughs nervously. “My boss, Rumjana, introduced us briefly at the Easter party. He’s an investor, I think they’re cousins or something.”

He’s really not that impressed, but: “Maybe you know all my friends.”

“Probably not, I haven’t worked with them for long.”

The navigation takes them up north, and he sure hopes Elizabeth packed enough warm clothes, because he’s not ready for another round of the disrupting of her packing schedule. Truth to be told, he knows there’s a few activities on the agenda, but the descriptions of those were vague at best. He’s kind of worried if _he’s_ ready for all that might be thrown at them. But she doesn’t have to know that now. 

She’s on her phone, and he can see from the corner of his eye that she’s going through some pictures before starting to reply to a text. 

“That ya kids?” She smiles, while she finishes her text. “Kenny won his game?” She mentioned it when they were having dinner. One’s called Emma, but he can’t recall the other ones. 

She puts her phone away. “No, they lost. Don’t tell him, but their team is terrible. My sister’s sitting them, she was just sending the absolute havoc they reaped onto my kitchen. It’s a miracle the house is still standing.”

“We’ve been gone for less than two hours.”

“Well, you don’t know my kids or my sister,” she jokes, but it’s laced with something sad or bitter she’s trying to hide under the surface. 

“Didn’t you say you have an ex?”

“He had to work. They’re going there Friday though.” It’s Wednesday now. He and Rhea are good now, even though she gave him a friendly roll of her eyes when he had told her he couldn’t take Marcus this weekend. To be fair, he had told her a month in advance, Elizabeth had to arrange this a few days prior. 

“And by work I mean he wasn’t able to cut his work trip to Chicago short that he’s visiting with his boss with whom he’s been having an affair with when we were still married.” She pauses, looking out the window for a few seconds. “I’m sorry, this isn’t your problem. I mean, I’m sure Annie will corrupt them into having Dorito’s for breakfast again, but they’ll also have two days of infinite fun.”

“Pretty sure my son must have met your sister, he’s been begging for gummi bear meatloaf for days. You sure they don’t have a secret app group?”

“I don’t know, I still fax.” Her bright smile that follows does stupid things to him. 

They already talked a bit over the phone about how their lives look like, selling this boyfriend-girlfriend story. Elizabeth told him she’s divorced (Dean, douchebag), she has four kids (Kenny, Emma, something, something he’s pretty sure the other son’s name rhymes with Kenny, which is a whole different crime to be honest), she has a sister (Annie, “She’s lovely and caring, but also kind of the definition of chaos.”) and a best friend (Ruby – She told him a few things, but he mostly remembers she’s married to a cop). None of them know she does this, they think she caters to Rumjana’s exclusive parties. 

In return he shared some of his info, even though he was much less free with all the details. But she knows he has two sisters, one older (Lu) and one younger (Delilah). That he has a son, and okay, he might have shared some more about Marcus, but just because she was so enthusiastically sharing stories about her kids (Right, the other boy is Danny – if only he could remember the other one). And he told her he was in the business of counterfeit and prescription pills (she’d find out anyway on location, might as well prepare her in advance), which she was strangely neutral about, but given that she knows Grozdan, she’s probably unfazed about criminal clients. 

“Where’s Marcus for the next few days?” she asks. 

“With his mom, ‘til Saturday. After that I can only hope my mamá and my sisters won’t cuddle him to death over the weekend.”

They arrive at a pier, looking out over Lake Huron. Rio turns the engine off and they both get out of the car to look at the ferry schedule. “Looks like we got some time to kill,” he says, the next one won’t arrive until twenty minutes from now. 

She turns to him, something unmistakable exciting shining in her eyes, but she looks bashful. “Uhm, so, I was thinking. If I’m your girlfriend we must have covered some bases by now,” and truly, not the most enticing way he’s ever had a woman try to tempt him. But her hand that’s now on his shoulder, sliding it’s way across his neck to cup his chin feels divine. “Maybe we should…” she says, leaning into him.

“We should?” he just replies, breathing her in as she gets onto her tiptoes. 

She captures his lips then, all warm and hesitant, as if she’s exploring someone for the first time again. He’s holding back at first, letting her do the work as she sucks on his bottom lip. But soon he can’t restrain himself any more, circles an arm around her waist to pull her into him, before opening his mouth to her. She tries to pull back, but he slides his hand into her hair to pull her closer and he kisses her deeply now. Pouring the want he felt since their first meeting into her, and she reciprocates the same, pressing herself closer. Her tongue sliding over his as he feels a fire starting to burn lower in his belly. She moans as he slides the hand that was on her waist to her ass, pushing her higher, closer. 

That’s when a loud foghorn rudely interrupts them, and they quickly entangle. 

“Yo, lovebirds,” a black woman with a bleached blonde buzzcut hollers from what looks to be a one-car-only ferry. “What’s the password?”

Rio looks back at Elizabeth. Who looks pleasantly ravished with her hair disheveled, pulling her dress down as if he was ever pulling that up, her irises blown up from their endeavor. And he can’t promise he’s not a mirror image of that. He pushes her hair back affectionately before diverting his attention to the woman on the ferry. 

“Solomon Speaks,” he says. 

“Well, ride right on, you crazy kids!” she belts back, as she jumps upon the pier to attach the ferry. 

*

The ride on the ferry goes mostly without complications. Aside from Talisha, the captain apparently, trying to keep high-fiving Elizabeth for 'reeling in such a hottie'. She politely declines, cheeks burning. But he’s not sure if it’s embarrassment or just lingering heat, by the looks she’s throwing him. 

“Gustav will take you to your room,” Talisha says, as they drive off the ferry. She lights up a cigarette as she looks out onto the island. It is still early morning, and it’s pretty foggy still. “Just follow the road for about five minutes, you’ll see the house.”

It's a dirt road, and Rio’s pretty glad he had a four-wheel drive under his butt for this one. Elizabeth refuses to acknowledge anything about his car. She does have something to say about this island not being on her map. Which, when he just gives her the silent treatment for that, aside from a lopsided smirk, makes her come to the conclusion that it probably doesn’t take a lot of money to buy off a mapmaker when you’re a filthy rich crime lord.

They park next to what Elizabeth discretely describes as ‘a bunch of penis enlarging automobiles’ when they reach the estate. “That what Boland Motors taught you?” he can’t help but ask. 

When they get out of the car a thirty-something man, dressed up like some kind of English butler, is waiting for them. He’s accompanied by a young brunette, dragging along a cart that’s obviously ready for their luggage. 

“Gustav, I presume?” Elizabeth smiles at him. 

He smiles kindly back at her. “Elizabeth, I assume? Mr. Mendoza gave us only your first name, I hope it's alright if I use it?” he asks politely. 

“That’s alright.”

“Please, call me Rio,” he replies, not looking forward to being mister-ed all week long. 

The girl unloads their luggage and Gustav escorts them to the estate. And really, Talisha was selling this place short when she called it a house. It’s like they deposited an old English mansion right into the Michigan Lake. White slate, and an old impressive staircase leading up to the main entrance. He can see Elizabeth is equally, if not more impressed. 

Gustav leads them through the main entrance, which is just as ornate as Rio had expected. Lot’s of brass furniture and red drapes, over-excessive if you’d ask him, but it all matches. They’re led up the marble staircase to their room. The walls are either covered in full windows or in ornate artwork. As an art-enthusiast himself, Rio can tell these are worth a lot, even though they’re not his taste. These are mostly popular works, more of a show of wealth than an investment. But he can appreciate the work. 

Their room is fortunately a bit less frivolous than the rest of the house they’ve seen so far. Sure, it’s large, with a big canopy bed in the middle of the bedroom, and a marble en suite attached to it, but it’s mostly cream-colored and dark woods. None of the bold colors they encountered on their way in. And he’s kind of glad about that. No need to get attacked by décor when he’s coming back from an intense business meeting. 

After the girl, Danielle, comes with their luggage, they’re left on their own again. Which gives them some time to freshen up and possibly unpack. 

“I think I’m going to shower,” Elizabeth says, digging through her open suitcase on the bed. 

“No,” he says, making her look up, stilling her relaxed movement. “Take a bath.”

“We might be late.”

“I want to watch,” he says. And he does, he thinks as he travels his eyes across her body. 

She doesn’t make a show about it, not exactly. He sits onto the bed as she gathers a towel and some fancy shampoos or body rubs. At least that’s what he was thinking until she moves closer to him. “Untie me?” she asks, offering the side-knot to her wrap dress. He reaches out to pull the knot, making the dress fall to her sides, exposing her peach bra and panties. 

She takes her toiletries and moves backwards into the bathroom. When he hears the water pouring into the bath, he follows her, dragging one of the chairs along with him. She’s taken off her dress when he reaches the bathroom, settles down into the chair before watching her sit on the edge of the bath, feeling the water. 

“Feel good?” he asks, leaning back. 

She hums pleased, then stand up again, reaching her arms around her to the clasp of her bra. The room starts smelling like roses, and he guesses she must have poured in on of the flasks that are lined up for them at the bath’s edge. The room starts to steam up a bit, but he left the door open so he’s assuming it won’t disturb his vision. 

“Take it off,” he says, flexing a bit. 

She unclasps, her bra visibly being loosened. But she doesn’t take it off completely, moving towards him as she keeps it in place. “Do you—”

Before she has a chance to finish her sentence, he reaches out and roughly pulls it off, making her gasp like she’s in an old Hollywood movie. He takes in how her full breasts escape their boundary right before him. He hums back appreciative and she looks like she feeds on that. Fueling herself with more confidence. 

His eyes drop to her panties. “Take them off too.” 

“Why don’t you take something off?” she says, while she hooks one of her thumbs into the side of her undies. 

And, fair, probably, if he wasn’t the one that’s paying. But he gives her the courtesy of taking his beanie and his jacket off. Leaving him in a dark blue button-up and black jeans. 

Instead of continuing her striptease she moves closer to him, standing over him. “Can’t I get a kiss?” she asks coyly. And as much as he hates to admit it, that voice does do it for him, even though he really wants to unravel her. So he reaches one of his hands out and pulls her into his lap, caressing her sides when she circles her hands along his neck. 

He only has a chance to taste her lips before there’s a knock at their door. “I’m sorry!” they hear through the wood, and Elizabeth rests her head in his neck. “Mister Grozdan is wondering if you’re coming down for brunch in half an hour?” they hear, Danielle, from what he can tell, asking. 

“Yeah, we’ll be there,” he speaks loudly, as he pushes Elizabeth into his groin, making her feel him. Her breath hitches when he does. 

“I can’t take a bath in that time, and get ready for brunch,” she breathes against his ear. 

“Leave it,” he says, remorsefully. “We’ll get back to it later.”

“I can shower though,” she says cheekily, and pecks him on the lips.

*

He didn’t stick around in the bathroom through, convinced that seeing her all wet and rubbing herself with soap would make for a very uncomfortable brunch for him. 

“What can I do?” Elizabeth asks, while she finishes up her make-up in front of the vanity. 

He looks up at her in the mirror, adjusting his cufflinks. “Nah. You just be you.”

It's immediate, the way she turns in her seat. “You’re not here on vacation,” she says, as if she knows more than he does about this trip. “It’s work, and you want something. Let me help.”

He rolls his eyes, annoyed. And these damn cufflinks ain’t helping either. Before he has a chance to abandon that mission altogether, she’s in front of him, gently taking his wrist in her hands. “It ain’t a game.”

She nods. “I get that.” And she doesn’t, she really has such a limited idea of what he is dragging her into. Sure, he told her the basics. That his boss, Grozdan, has all his heads of operation come to this island, presenting it as some sort of celebration for how well everything’s going. But Rio’s sure he wants to do some reorganizing while they’re at it. 

When she’s finished he drops his hands to her waist. She’s wearing some sort of dark red number with white polka dots and combined with that expectant blue Bambi eyes and her pearl necklace it’s really driving this innocent housewife vibe home alright. “Just feel ‘em out, momma. Don’t go and get your head in the clouds ‘bout it, okay?” he says, pushing her hair back. 

He should have expected her to take it completely seriously.

During brunch they’re seated next to each other, so he could keep an eye on her. But after, Grozdan’s wife retreats her and everybody’s partners away to the garden. She kisses him on the cheek and whispers ‘I got this’ into his ear, before winking utmost obvious. And he wonders if it’s too late to call the agency to send him a dumb, obedient bimbo. 

“Yo, where you get them tits?” Chaz asks, gulping down half his beer at once. And, what? “Been trying to get Candy to get some,” he says, holding his hands out in cups in front of his chest. “No luck though, says it messes up gravity when she’s twirling on that pole of hers. Occupational hazard, ammi right?” he laugh-snorts. 

Chaz and Candy are the only other pair that doesn’t really fit the bill of white rich couples ready for a game of croquet. They may look like trailer trash, and act like it most of the time, but Chaz rules the synthetic drug market with an iron first. And he’s pretty sure she ain’t just a stripper either. 

He's not here to stir up a fight though. “Came with the package, man.” 

Grozdan’s presentation is mostly uneventful. He’s got one of his techs explaining a new, better secured, messaging system he wants them to start using. He’ll have one of his own guys check it out, make sure it isn’t bugged or something. He figures Grozdan wants to get the boring stuff out of the way first, douching them in numbers and pie charts and projectives. Which is truthfully interesting, but he finds he’s having a hard time keeping his focus while he can see Elizabeth in the garden, being entertained by some champagne fueled flower arranging workshop.

The energy has pretty subsided over the past hours, so they call it a day for now. Saving presenting new ventures for another time. 

Rio’s never been happier to with an infuse of oxygen after the conservatory doors have been opened, no wonder he was losing his concentration. He strides across the grass, circling his arms around Elizabeth’s waist, pulling her into him. She’s still fiddling with the bouquet in front of her. “Having a good time, honey?” he asks too frivolous, burying his head in her neck. 

She giggles, slightly tipsy, judging by the empty bottles on the table. “What do you think of my bouquet? Zhenya thinks it would be very fitting for our wedding.” The other women at the table nod and smile feverously. 

“We gettin’ married now?” If that was an actual future event, it will most certainly not be with this monstrosity she created . He knows he’s making assumptions, but he didn’t think that the woman who looks like she invented the title of Domestic Goddess would put something together that wouldn’t even get a consolation prize at a charity clown-costume contest.

She turns her head and kisses him. “I told them it’s a little early for that. But apparently we’d make beautiful babies, and if that isn’t a reason to get hitched I don’t know what is.”

Rio snorts, and looks around the table. “Don’t hold your breath, ladies. We already got a brood between us.” 

After collecting some disappointed swoons he gets Elizabeth to follow him upstairs to finally start unpacking. He can’t, however, stop her from bringing her flowers. 

She has this smug smile on her face the entire time she’s unpacking her suitcases, glancing at that bouquet all the while. He’s not going to indulge her, takes some time calling Marcus on the balcony while she’s arranging her toiletries and robes (and, really, plural?) in the bathroom. When he steps back into the room she’s sitting cross legged in one of the chairs like she’s Don Corleone or something. 

“Somethin’ you wanna tell me, Elizabeth?”

She twirls the dark liquid in her tumbler around before returning his gaze to him. “You guys weren’t the only ones doing business.”

His face drops. “What did you do?”

“Not me!” she takes a swig of her drink. “It’s Candy, Zhenya and Marina. They were… signaling.”

He knows Jay, Marina’s husband. They wash cash through their kitchen dealerships across the state, Rio’s money. Also have a lot of illegal workers on payroll, mostly Eastern-Europe. He doesn’t know what other operation Candy’s running through the strip clubs, but that could be connected. He doesn’t know how Zhenya ties into all this, he hasn’t met her before. “Signaling?”

Elizabeth eyes her flower arrangement again. “They were waiting for each other to put new flowers into their arrangements. I missed the first few, but I replicated their other moves. Got slightly eclectic though.”

It’s absolutely insane. 

She puffs out her chest like a proud turkey, and even though she’s got other intentions with it, it gives him whole other ideas. 

And, look, it’s not like this little investigation of hers isn’t entertaining. So he decides to humor her. “Yeah. So what yo flowers stand for then?”

It's like he popped a firecracker, because she belts out of that chair like she’s been sitting on this speech for an eternity. “So, I wasn’t sure at first, but then Candy and Zhenya started to just have some kind of dialogue. First Zhenya put in a Bluebell, and Candy countered with a red rose. Then Zhenya stepped away to make a call, and when she came back she put in a white flower. White means ‘deal’.”

She walks him through more of her findings, and he’s really only half listening. Her utter conviction and quick thinking have him completely enthralled. She’s so wrapped up in her story she doesn’t notice him sneaking up to her. And when she turns around he’s chest to chest with her, she gasps, a bit spooked by his sudden closeness. Before she has a chance to say something he slides a hand up her leg, under her dress.

“Don’t you want to hear the rest?” she asks, as his other hand starts working on the top buttons of her dress. 

“Didn’t tell you to stop,” he says, watching himself unbuttoning her slowly, while his other hand massages her thigh. 

She lets out a broken laugh. “You’re making that awfully difficult,” she says, leaning into his touch. 

“Missed half my boss presentation because of you,” he murmurs against her neck. “Every time wind got a hold on this damn dress I just wanted to bend you over that table.”

“Oh.”

He finally finishes all those buttons and her dress falls open. She pushes her chest out to him, and he wastes no time caressing her breasts through her bra. He can sense she’s a bit tense, and he doesn’t want that. “Chaz asked me where you got your tits.” Her chest rumbles with a laugh as he mouths the top of one. 

She tries to shake off the dress, but he's got her pinned against a canopy pole. She grabs his chin, dragging his face up. “What did you tell him?”

“None of his fucking business,” he says, before attacking her lips. He helps her get off that damn dress, shoving it harshly off her shoulders, making her moan into his mouth. Her hands start unbuttoning his shirt as they move towards the bed. When her legs hit the bed he gives her a push, making her fall backwards. 

“Take it all off,” he says, eyes blazing, as he makes quick work of his shirt. Taking it off a whole lot faster than it took getting it on. He’s so quick, she only had time to unhook her bra and untangle it from her body before he joins her onto the bed. She crawls back against the pillows while he chases her, hoovering over her before capturing her lips again. “You have no idea how much I want you, mami,” he groans against her mouth. 

That’s when he feels one of her hands cupping him through his jeans. “I have an idea,” she smiles. 

And he can’t believe this crazy minx is for real. Moaning and withering against him like he’s the first one to read this damn book. He kisses and sucks his way down from her mouth, to her chin, along the line of her neck. Trailing down a made-up path along her freckles until he reaches her breasts. He captures one of her nipples and she lets out a restrained groan. 

“Don’t hold back,” he tells her, as he lets go of her nipple with an obscene sound. 

She moves her head in what he can only assume is a nod. There’s a blush spreading on her face and down her chest now, and her skin is coated in a thin layer of sweat. He smiles at her before turning his attention to her other nipple, making her squirm beneath him. He bites it lightly, making her try to escape against the headboard before he sits back on his haunches and pulls her back. 

“You okay?”

“Yeah.”

He hooks his fingers in her panties and pulls them down roughly, holding onto each other’s gaze. “Grab the headboard,” he tells her. And her fingers circle tentatively around the bars above her head. 

He grabs her thighs in a tight hold before bending down. They’re still looking at each other as he licks his lips, and she’s just staring back at him, heated, waiting. When he bends down and licks her slit she practically belts from the bed, but she keeps holding onto the bars – her knuckles turning white by the strength she’s squeezing them with. His brain almost short-circuits when his tongue touches her center. Not just from her taste, but the honest, feral reaction he gets from her. 

“More,” she pouts, trembling in his grasp. 

“Patience, baby,” he shushes her. 

He bends down again, his lips going straight to her clit now, suckling onto it leisurely, working her up too slow from what he can tell from her whimpers. She’s so wet for him already, feels it sticking to his scruff. It’s not enough for her, even though she’s not telling him. It takes her by surprise that he suddenly inserts two fingers into her, stroking her front wall lazily as he keeps sucking onto her nub.

It is a real sight to see when he looks up at her again. She’s mewling louder with every roll of her hips, fucking his mouth and fingers with abandon. “Look at me,” he orders, guttural, before continuing his ministrations. Her eyes open, pupils blown while she tries not to have her lids fall close again as he feels her starting to clench on his fingers. 

And she doesn’t hold back when she comes, wailing into the pillows she’s buried in. 

“Oh my god,” she croaks through her panting, as she entangles her hands from the bars. 

It's something he wouldn’t mind seeing a lot more from. Elizabeth fucked out and sprawled in his bed, her pearls pooled between her heaving breasts. She smiles woozily at him when he gets up from the bed, getting rid of his jeans and kicking off his socks. She watches him through hooded eyes, trying to regain her breath. He reaches into the drawer of the nightstand, grabbing a condom. They keep eye contact as he gets rid of the wrapper, rolling it down his shaft. Before he can ask she skootches over, giving him space to lay down next to her. He reaches out to her and meets her in a sloppy kiss, that she answers feverously. 

After they pull back, he leans back against the cushions and slaps his thighs. “Hop on, babe,” he smirks. 

She smiles back, a little sex-drunk, before getting into his lap. She strokes him a few times before lining him up with her. “Rio,” she pants, redirecting her eyes from between them to his eyes. “I want this.”

And it’s not like he didn’t notice. He truly doesn’t have any experience with paying someone to be with him. But he would like to think that if this were just a job, he’d be able to see it, to feel it. But that’s not what he’s feeling, this might not just be business – before diverting to a more realistic thought: Maybe she’s just that good. 

He puts a hand on her ass and guides her down. “I know,” he says, as he breaches her with his cock. And her face is something made for memories. Her plumb, pink lips falling open with the sensation of taking him in. Her eyes falling close in a frown, not uncomfortable, but getting used to him inside of her. Her hands reaching out to his shoulders, grappling to find purchase. He sits up, pushing her breast into him, making this all the more intimate, their faces close. “You got this,” he croaks into her ear, before sucking her lobe between his teeth.

She’s contracting around him like crazy, and it takes all his willpower not to come right here and now. That’s not what he wants - yet. He strokes a few sweaty strands of hair from her face, making her open her eyes again to him. “Fuck me, baby,” and he didn’t mean to speak that so broken, but he’s wrecked. And he doesn’t think it’s so different for her as well. 

She steadies her arms on his shoulder and starts moving onto him, not restraining herself as she softly moans every time he hits a special spot inside of her. She adjusts a few times until she apparently feels like he’s touching her the best way possible. And he bends down his head to suck her neck, whispering encouraging words to her as she works herself onto him. He notices she wants to entangle one of her arms at one point, but decides against it, riding him harder until she belts out sweet, short moans into his ear. 

And that’s his que, he puts his hands on her hips, dragging her down onto him. Fucking her through her own orgasm while she’s trying to push him away, probably feeling too sensitive. But he’s coming now and he’s jutting out embarrassing moans against her chest as he comes into the condom. 

After a few seconds she dismounts him, making him frown at the loss as he feels her heath leaving him. But she falls back next to him, stroking his chest. They’re a mess of entangled limbs and sweaty body parts. She reaches out to kiss him briefly. 

“We got dinner next,” she smiles against him. 

He snorts. “Didn’t we raincheck that shower?” 

*

During their shower Elizabeth gives him the short version of her flower theory. Zhenya provides a service to Candy and Marina. They negotiated amounts and prices, not wanting Elizabeth and the other partner, Antonia, to know. 

“They told me I should wear something fancy tomorrow,” she says, as they walk down the hallway. It’s not something she likes to say, judging from her tone. 

“So?” 

She fumbles with her dress. It fits her really good and he likes it, but it’s not like this floral fitting dress has anything on some of the other spouses’ wardrobes.

“Don’t worry about it,” he says. 

He doesn’t elaborate, and she eyes him suspiciously. So she rambles on about how she’s sure she can hide any tags so he can return it later. When they reach the bottom of the stairs he strokes her butt and kisses her before leaving her to the claws of the wives. He’s meeting up with Grozdan again. 

They discuss a few new ideas before dinner. He teamed up with Chaz and his chemist abroad, having them design better prescription Oxy and Adderall. They’ve started a trial for the last two months, and it’s gaining traction much more rapidly than either of them expected, especially in the white suburbia market. And they pay more than twenty lowlifes per delivery, so it’s very much worth the effort. Grozdan says he’ll think about it, but Rio is already calculating in the win. 

“Thin walls,” is the first thing Elizabeth says, flushed, into his ear when they reunite shortly before dinner. They laugh about it, finding it more amusing than embarrassing that they’re apparently the talk of the town. She’s sitting in his lap, while they’re watching people being seated at the dinner table, when Elizabeth leans into him. “They’re still up to something,” she whispers, dropping it as a fact. And, right, her conspiracy theory. 

Dinner goes by in friendly chit-chat. When they finally get to bed Rio wraps himself around her and closes his eyes before he falls into a deep slumber. And he thinks he doesn’t regret picking this woman as his partner, Elizabeth might even be the perfect one. 

*

“Get in the boat, Elizabeth.” 

Rio’s already prepping the boat, while she’s standing on the dock in the boathouse. 

“Won’t we get in trouble?” she asks. And he knows he told her to get into something fit for outdoors, but seeing her standing there, arms crossed in her pink blouse, tapping her foot impatiently in some run-of-the-mill sneakers – maybe he should have specified more, because she’s gone full-blown fieldtrip on this one. 

“I’ll write you a note,” he says, and holds out his hand for her to take. 

She’s not wrong though, he’s pretty sure Grozdan didn’t intend for them to leave. The ferry that took them to the island isn’t docked anywhere in sight, which is a whole other worry he might let slip in a meeting later that afternoon. 

“He’s not my boss, I guess,” she says, taking his hand as he helps her get into the boat. The wobbling of the boat makes her a bit unstable and he takes full advantage of that by pulling her back against his chest. As much as that’s nice, it’s also crisis management because he’s sure she’ll be complaining about how cold it is. 

The engine starts up with a low rumble before really it really fires up. Rio reaches out and puts Beth’s hands on the steering wheel, which she immediately tries to retract. She looks up at him, wide-eyed. Before she has a chance, he swallows her objections with a brief kiss. “Take it easy, momma. I’ll teach you.”

They arrive in the port-town about forty-five minutes later. Mostly due to the fact that teaching Elizabeth how to drive a boat wasn’t at all the sexy student-teacher fantasy he had in mind. She gets a hang of it technically quite fast, her ability to listen to his directions is abominable, which he guesses he should have known from their drive. Rounding their tour up with demonstrating her non-existent parking skills, nearly throwing him off the boat in the process. 

The town is, for lack of a better word, adorable. Judging by the amount of yachts and boats at the dock he can tell most inhabitants live well above middle class, and the restaurants and lounge places along the lakeside tell that exact same story. Or course Elizabeth takes a liking to a more cozy, tiny coffee place where they decide to have breakfast. 

It's like he can sense it, a millisecond before his phone starts going off he’s already reaching his hand into his pocket. “Gotta take this,” he says, when they halt in front of a store. “You go in,” he cocks his head at the entrance. She follows his gaze, falters when she takes in the boutique. “Get something fancy, alright? Be right there.”

Turns out his call takes a little longer than he expected. First Mick calls. One of their money couriers was in a car crash. It wasn’t even something gang related, just sheer dumb luck where the other driver ran a red light. Gretchen got the kid out, who’d been impressively holding up during a seven-hour interrogation. There was very minor chance they’d get the money back, and even if they did, that clean money was still cooked. 

Without a second to spare Grozdan calls him after he hangs up on Mick, ordering him to get back to the house as soon as possible. Rio considers cracking a few jokes but judging from Grozdan’s tone that’s only going to make matters worse. So he makes up something about needing to send some files, and having terrible reception at the island, which Grozdan can’t really argue (it’s not the best, certainly not for large encrypted files) – and they’ll get back as soon as possible. 

When he gets back to the store, he almost enters before seeing Elizabeth sitting on a bench a few feet away, crying silently into a disco-dipped froyo. 

He saunters over and sits down next to her. “So what’s up?”

She snorts and dabs under her eyes with cotton handkerchief, erasing the watered down mascara. “Those bitches wouldn’t help me.”

And, can’t lie, he’s slightly taken aback by her language. In a good way. 

“Apparently, I don’t _fit their aesthetic._.”

There’s really not a lot of options in this town, and with Grozdan breathing down his neck they don’t have time to go to a another port. But he ain’t leaving here without making his girl happy either. “Wait here,” he says, pushing himself up from the bench. “Come see me in five minutes.”

When he walks into the boutique a blonde woman immediately flocks him. He sees here clocking what he’s got on, doing the math of adding his limited edition watch, to his designer shirt to his expensive sneakers; she knows if she plays this well she could live of that commission for weeks. Rio puts on his most friendly face. 

“I’m Amber, how can I help you?’ she smiles. 

“Amber, my girl’s meeting me here. And I need someone to really take care of her, you feel me?” he says, returning her smile. 

“Of course, I’ll set something up.” She brushes off. 

Elizabeth joins him, looking a bit more like herself again. He circles an arm around her and pulls her into him. Soon Amber returns and physically missteps when she sees Elizabeth standing next to Rio, and it shouldn’t be so amusing, how she’s racking her brain for an adequate response. Rio spots another salesgirl at the cash register. 

“What’s her name?”

“Diane," she says, as if on auto pilot.

“Yo, Diane!” he says, drawing her attention. She makes her way to the three of them, a cheerful skip in her step. “Wanna help my girl out, find some dresses?” She nods gingerly and drags Elizabeth off. Rio looks back at Amber. “Sorry, love. You don’t really fit our aesthetic.”

He ends up buying her three dresses. And he has Diane take the tags off, because he knows he will never hear the end of it. Gives Diane a generous tip, making sure the other shop girl has that clearly in sight. Diane’s so happy she wants to hug him. He politely declines. 

*

Elizabeth licks greedily into his mouth as he pushes her back against a pool table. It is ridiculously juvenile how they climbed in through a window to avoid being seen by the rest of the guests. This little bit of B&E sparking something in her that has her trembling with want, sliding her hands up his torso under his shirt.

And as much as it pains him, he circles her wrists with his hands and steps back. He reaches out and strokes her cheek. “Gotta go see my boss, ma.”

Her snipper of a groan makes him almost reconsider, but she will have to wait. 

He should have reconsidered. 

Grozdan takes his sweet time highlighting the importance of this week, pointedly looking at Rio all the while. He’s planning a charity event, boxing, for three months from now. Inviting a bunch of distributors from outer state. It’s a good opportunity to expand, not just for Grozdan, Rio sees some personal chances here as well. He knows that scene, and he’s pretty sure most these guys wouldn’t know a boxing ring if it hit them in the face. Just gotta dent out that small inconvenience from this morning.

The garden isn’t as calm as he expected it to be. The definition of ‘garden’ is probably underselling it actually. The landscaping has probably cost millions, transforming what was most likely an unkept and overgrown island to the sight it is today. His steps crunch on the pebbled path as he makes his way to the clearing further back. 

“Pull!” he hears, followed by a shot and a dust cloud appears in the air. 

On closer inspection he sees it’s Elizabeth standing on the grass, a shotgun wedged against her shoulder. She’s got a pair of ear defenders on, highly focused on steadying her aim. “Pull!” she says, as Candy releases a bird from the trap. He follows her line of vision and can’t help clenching his fingers when he feels like she should fire. 

She waits a little longer though, firing when the bird starts its downward trajectory. But she blows it into smithereens non the less. She doesn’t explode in enthusiasm, but Candy’s got that covered for the both of them. 

“Nice shot, momma.”

Elizabeth turns around when she got rid of her ear defenders. She breaks into a shy smile when she sees him, he can see she’s repressing that she’s proud. Or maybe she just likes hearing him say it. 

“Your girl’s a natural,” Candy says, taking the shotgun from her. “Got in three shots in a row. I can fire one of my security guys if you’re looking for a new job.”

“That’s alright. I’m kind of in between things, selling my old house and stuff. I might be looking for something when I’m all set up in my new apartment.” 

“I’m kidding,” Candy laughs. “No offense, but I don’t see you knocking out those rioters at the club.”

Elizabeth hands her the ear defenders. “I’m tougher than I look.”

Candy gets a text. “Gotta go. See you tonight, sweety.”

Rio cocks an eyebrow at Elizabeth when Candy’s out of hearing distance. “Tonight?”

She circles her arms around his neck. “We’re having dinner in our own room.”

“Yeah? Who signed off on that?” Not looking forward to getting reprimanded again. 

“Zhenya. She wanted to have dinner with her husband. Gave us all free range to plan our own time until tonight’s activity.”

“That’s a lot of time to kill,” he says, capturing her lips. Before she has a chance to put in a suggestion Rio picks her up and throws her over his shoulder. 

“Rio!” she shrieks. “Put me down!” she tries to command him, while he carries her back to the house. He smacks her ass when she refuses to stop squirming. “I’ll make you pay,” she giggles, making it thoroughly unimpressive. She can’t see it, but when he comes closer to the glass doors he can see his own smile reflected in the glass – yeah, it’s been a while since he had so much fun with anyone. 

When they’re back in their room he hauls her up onto the dresser, making a bunch of trinkets fall off the surface. She laughs against his lips. “Aren’t you eager.”

Rio grabs her under her thighs and drags her closer to the edge, tighter against him. “You have no idea,” he replies, capturing her lips again. Making her squirm against him when he lightly bites her bottom lip. His hands find the hem of her shirt, and he pulls it off her in one quick motion, revealing a very intricate mint lace bra. He leans back, taking her in as he reaches out a hand to palm her through the sheer cup, grazing her nipple with his thumb. 

She tries to hold herself back, not lean into his touch too much. “Do you like it?” she asks, dragging a few fingers from her neck down the valley of her breasts. And he knows, okay, shouldn’t let this woman wrap him around her finger like this. Yet she’s this alluring vortex that keeps sucking him in every time he tries to untangle.

“It’s a set,” she adds, when he doesn’t answer. 

Screw it.

He barely registers how fast his hands reach out to open her jeans, revealing the mint ridge of her panties. He puts a hand on her shoulder, intending to push her back, when she winces. It spooks him, but she reaches out and cradles his chin. “Blowback from the shotgun,” she smiles, taking his worry away. Look, they’ve settled on safe words, he knows when he’ll initiate that’s truly unwanted, but he’s just got this… care for her. Like she’s his - already. And he’s sincerely doubting if he can step away from that. 

She pulls him to her in a sloppy kiss, while he slips his hand into her panties, making her moan into his mouth. And, Jesus fuck, she’s already so wet for him. Moving against him as soon as he caresses his digits through her warm folds. But he can’t see, so he retracts his hand, and she’s not happy about it, judging by her frown. He makes quick work of taking her shoes and pants of, throwing them around the room. 

He takes a step back, looking at this divine woman perched upon this dresser. Her arm makes its way around her back. “Nuh-uh,” he tuts, discarding himself of his hoodie and shirt, moving into her again. “Leave it on.”

She seems smug, far too happy that she picked out some lingerie that he likes. Blind to the fact that he couldn’t fucking care if it is mint or red or really anything, that it’s on her, that’s what he finds most enticing. It’s infuriating, that she can get him to behave like this by purely existing, by telling him stories about her family, or bossing it up with her (and he’s come to entertain that idea in a more serious matter thanks to her) crime theory about these other women, or just plain kissing him. 

His hand finds its way to her thigh while he leans into her. “Touch yourself,” he says, roughly shoving the crotch of her underwear aside. She shivers against him, but complies, though in a tedious slow pace. A blush spreads fast across her cheeks and chest, like she might feel too coy to do so. He grabs her wrist before she reaches her goal and kisses the inside while capturing her gaze. “I _wanna_ see.” 

It seems like his wanting look is enough to fuel her spirit as she starts rubbing two fingers over her entrance. She flinches by the sounds it emulates in the silence of their room. “That’s it, baby,” he breathes against her lips, enthralled, “Go on.”

He bends down and captures a nipple through the sheer fabric of her bra, nearly catapulting her against the mirror behind her back. Her soft panting tells him she’s getting closer to release, but he doesn’t want her to do that herself. And when he whisks her hand away she lets out a sigh he can only pinpoint as bewildered. 

They fumble together to get his belt off and shove his pants low enough for him to finally get his straining cock out. He drags her off the dresser and turns her around, watching her through the mirror as she finds purchase on the surface. He drags his cock through her folds, eliciting the most wonderful sounds from her while she arches her back. 

“Rio, just,” she pulls open the top drawer, getting out one of her toiletry bags. 

He doesn’t know how fast he gets this condom on, but he has no recollection of it afterwards. His hand fans out on her thigh as he pushes into her to the hilt. He stills, creating the memory of being buried in her wanton walls forever, until she contracts around him, hard. When he looks at her in the mirror she’s smiling cheekily. 

He pulls out almost completely before slamming back into her, the wail that escapes her doing inhumanly things to him. It doesn’t take a lot of those strokes to get her sobbing onto him, hitting her hand of the flat surface of the dresser, trying to find a way to expel her energy. Her legs barely hold her up, so he pushes her more into the dresser, giving him just enough room to sneak his hand between them to play with her clit. 

It's too much, she tells him so, but he keeps giving her his ministrations and she comes again. Dragging him with her while she pulses violently around him. Her chest heaves while she tries to regain her breath, and he’s not much better off, to be honest. Bending his neck to lick her neck, where he knows is a hickey hidden from yesterday under a layer of concealer. She leans into it heavily, silently begging him to mark her more. And, well, he complies. 

After a minute or so they reluctantly entangle to clean themselves up. 

“Zhenya offered me a job,” she says, emerging from the en suite in matching mint robe. 

It takes him a moment to wrap his mind around the complications that could bestow on them if she does that. As far as he knows everyone thinks Elizabeth isn’t involved with his criminal activities, that they met when their kids were participating in a school soccer competition. If she joins whatever these mob wives have lined up for her that’s going to change. Yet he can’t the deny the gleeful feeling bubbling in his belly of seeing her again after they exit this bubble of a week. It’s not too bad if she plays along for now – he can easily get her out of it, break up with her. 

“What is it?” 

“Help organize this charity event,” she says, with much more disinterest than the sparkle in her eyes is telling him. 

But he should say no – even if she gives a promise of commitment, it doesn’t make it a definite thing - he can see what the prospect’s already doing to her. Should tell her that tainting herself with this world isn’t worth it, walk away from this den of serpents that leave no one unscathed. But then it hits him, bitterly – he’s already brought her into this. He’s already ruined her.

“You wanna do it.”

He's not asking, but she starts rambling anyway. “I mean, I told her I’d think about it. I understand if you don’t want to see me again after this, I know it’s just work.” He’s going to blatantly ignore whatever ugly feeling just shot through him. “If you don’t want me to, I get it. But I’ve been working three jobs--“

He cuts her off with a kiss. 

“So go do it.” 

The smile that beams back at him totally wrecks him.

They change into somewhat representable outfits, and Elizabeth excuses herself to the balcony to call in with her family. And, right, kids going to her ex again tomorrow. She’s probably checking in if her kids and sis didn’t destroy her house too much. 

Anyway, he has to call Gretchen, making sure that kid and the car crash won’t get them any trouble. He mentioned it vaguely to Grozdan, even if it’s not really his problem. It’s Rio’s own problem if money doesn’t get to the intended destination in timely fashion. But that has been arranged by now, he has a bunch of money stashed in untraceable places to take care of issues like this. 

Gretchen, of course, wants to check something else. “So, she any good?”

He watches Elizabeth from an angle her sister can’t pick up through the video call. She laughs at something Annie says, magicking a smile of his own on his face. “Yeah, she’s alright.”

“Uh huh.”

“Yeah, she’s cool. Thanks for the tip.” Way too cheerful, dumbass. 

Look, he’s knows Gretchen since his high school days, she can read through all his bullshit. “Be smart, okay,” she says. And she says it in her business voice, but he can pick up a suspicious undercurrent when he hears one. 

“Got it, boss,” he jokes. 

When they hang up, he moves closer to where Elizabeth’s sitting on the lounge set on the balcony, but he stays inside. It’s not a conversation he has any right of hearing, he knows that, but he can’t refrain himself. 

“They’re all packed! I even threw in some of those granola bars you made so they won’t starve when they’re at Douchebag Central. But, you know, Danny’s sad you can’t really see him tomorrow,” he hears, from what he knows is the sister. 

He sees Elizabeth sag a little in her chair. “I know, and I will call him tomorrow morning! Before they go to Dean.”

“Ugh.”

“What ugh?”

“Nobody should say ‘Dean’ without an ‘ugh’. I’m just trying to dog you into that for any future reference.”

“Dog?” Elizabeth laughs. 

“Yeah, you know. Like the dog and the treats. I didn’t pick up a lot in Biology, but I know that was a thing.”

“I’m pretty sure it’s called Pavlov.”

“Okay, Einstein, let’s go with that! Anyway, he’s been okay, just getting used to not having you around. I told him you’ll be at Judith’s on Sunday when he has his party. Also promised him that we may or may not watch Chucky in the near future.”

“He’s ten!”

“Ten, twelve. Potato, tomato.”

She spots him from the corner of her eye, he can tell. “I have to go. Love you!”

They wrap up the conversation and she steps back into the room. 

“Didn’t mean to pry. Your sister’s very loud.”

She quickly kisses him. And, sure, he’ll follow that lead.

*

They’re being served some kind of pokébowl situation for dinner, which might be the highlight takeaway for Elizabeth from their days together. Not because this dish is something special, but she can not stop looking at him from her end of the couch as he’s eating it. 

“You’re not serious,” she laughs. 

It’s fundamentally lost on him what she’s talking about, and he raises his eyebrow at her accordingly. 

“This is your actual chopstick game?” 

He looks at the sticks in between his fingers, to the bowl, back to Elizabeth. She has a big mouth for someone carrying around a clipboard for work. 

“What’s wrong with how I eat?” he throws at her, attacking a particularly slippery piece of avocado.

Elizabeth is biting her lip to the point of puncturing it with her bitty vampire teeth as she tries to press down her laughter. “Nothing,” she says, making a show of carefully pinching a piece of tuna sashimi between her chopsticks. “My seven-year-old would be proud of you.”

That’s it. He puts the bowl onto the coffee table with a loud thud and grabs her feet, pulling them into his lap, dragging her down while she’s haphazardly clenching her bowl, trying not to spill its contents. “Rio! I’m eating!”

His hand circles around her ankle, taking it in an iron grip. Her eyes widen as he softly grazes his fingertips over the sensitive middle of her foot, making her spasm. “Don’t,” she says, as if she’s reprimanding one of her kids. 

It didn’t take long for him to discover she’s ticklish. Has elicited sighs wrapped in a smile when he brushed his lips against the nape of her neck, got her squirming when he kneaded the skin on her ribs too light. His mouth twists into a predatory smirk as he strokes the underside of her foot, making her trash violently as she tries to get away. 

“Rio!” she wails, her robe falling open as she still clutches the bowl in her hands. Her other leg flails, kicking his side, but it’s only fueling the intensity of his tickling. 

“You was saying?” 

“Stop!” And, she can’t help it, can’t hold her grip steady on the bowl any longer. The contents tumbling all over her chest and her stomach. From the pinkening of her cheeks he can immediately tell that she’s mortified, probably worrying if they ruined the couch. 

He stops though, but crawls over her instantly, not giving her any time to clean up. Her chest is heaving as he captures a few edamame beans from the border of her panties, looking at her intensely as he licks his way up to her bellybutton. 

She reaches out for him, stroking his head with her nails, enticing a low groan from him. “You made a big mess.” 

He hums against the soft skin of her belly as he cleans a patch of rice and seaweed away. “Better clean it up, yeah.”

It's alarming, how affectionately she watches him as he covers every part of her skin with his mouth, when he’s not actually cleaning her, placing open-mouthed kisses crossing the distances in between. Her hand leaves his head, and he’s embarrassed by the disappointed sound that leaves his throat, fortunately it’s mostly drowned against her skin. She takes a piece of sashimi from her tit and holds it close to his mouth. 

Her lips part as he sucks it in along with her fingers, watching her intently as he bites down just a tad bit harder, denting her digits. It’s not hard enough to draw blood, but when he relaxes around her, he licks the blemished skin before she retracts. As fussy as she is about light touches, this is something new and exciting he’ll file away for later. 

“I’m cold,” she sulks after a while. And, sure, she’s laying on the couch in just her bra and panties, French doors open blowing in the chilly evening breeze, grazing her saliva covered skin. 

He's hovering over her now, capturing her lips in a deep and lazy kiss before extracting himself and sitting back on his hunches. It’s too bad they’re expected to make an appearance downstairs later, he thinks he could stay like this for a while longer. 

*

“Oh, I’ve done all the fundraisers,” Elizabeth brags a little too confident, sipping her fourth wine. “Sports days, farmers markets, bachelor auctions, bake-offs.”

Candy clinks her glass against hers. “Doing the Lord’s work.”

Rio redirects his attention back to the conversation he’s having with Jay and Khazanov, discussing some new distribution lines for the enhanced prescription drugs. Well, at least that’s what they were doing. 

“Yup, child number five. Should have seen that coming marrying a thirty-year-old,” Khazanov says, downing the remainder of his whiskey. He hasn’t seen too much of Antonia, who’s sitting next to Elizabeth, twirling her empty glass in her hand. She’s his third wife, twenty years his junior, those are really the only things he knows. Then again, he can also imagine she might be intimidated by the presence of Zhenya, Candy, Marina… and Elizabeth. 

“Congratulations!” he hears the women, toasting with Antonia, who’s cheeks are burning, smiling shyly. 

“Guess the word’s out,” Khazanov says, grabbing a refill. Rio declines as he hoovers the bottle over his glass. 

“Nah, man. Still overdosing on that two-hour string quartet.”

Elizabeth saunters over to him and tiredly circles her arms around him, nuzzling her head against his shoulder. “I’m sleepy,” she mopes. “Take me to bed.”

Jay wolf whistles into his drink. 

“Not like that,” she yawns, slapping his chest. 

They exchange quick goodbyes before wandering into the foyer. Elizabeth’s taken her heels off, swinging them in one hand while she leans her other side against him. 

“You enjoying herself?”

“It’s nice.”

“Nice.”

She stops on the plateau of the halfway mark of the stairs, turns to look at him. “I haven’t been someone’s girlfriend in over twenty years. So, yes, it’s nice. Even if it isn’t real.”

He’s mentally focused on the latter part of what she’s saying – doesn’t enjoy the nasty chill dripping down his spine, before circling back to the beginning. She brushes past him to continue her ascend, but he grabs her by her wrist to stop her. 

“You don’t do this,” he says, motioning between them. And he’s not even really sure what he’s trying to say with that, maybe even better to leave it as vague as it is. 

She shrugs. “Only you.”

And. _Oh._

“Tryna make me feel special, ma?” he says, unsure what to do with this situation. 

She yanks her wrist back. “Fine. Don’t believe me.” Before he has a chance to respond she scurries up the stairs, making a beeline for their room. 

He catches her just outside the door, rattling the doorknob like she lost all ability to control her motor functions. Is she, crying? 

“Go away,” she speaks softly, somber even, back turned towards him. “You’re ruining it.”

He waits her out, standing in the dark, seemingly endless hallway. It takes her a few shivering exhales before she turns around to face him. Her eyes glister when she looks up at him. 

“Ruining what?” 

She motions her hand clumsily between them, much like he did a few minutes ago. “This.”

“Why’s that?”

“I did something,” she whispers, barely audible. 

He reaches his hand out and cradles her face. 

“Rio,” she says, covering his hand with hers. “I’m not an escort.” Her eyes dart between his, searching for something. Anything. 

He rocks his jaw, dropping his gaze. Look, he ain’t an idiot. Had done a background check on her himself. Can’t really afford to be dragging some undercover FBI agent into a crime lair like this. He wouldn’t live through the week. But she came up clean. No ties to any law enforcement, not even a parking ticket. 

“You do work for ‘em.” 

She rubs her thumb over his hand, calling back his attention. 

“I do the intakes.”

All of a sudden, an uncontrollable laughter bubbles up in his throat and he cannot keep it inside of him either. “You do the intakes,” he guffaws. 

She snorts, clapping a hand over her mouth, his laugh contagious to her nervous state. 

“So, what’ya saying?” he asks, after his laugh’s reduced to hiccups. He drags his eyes up and down her body, before looking back into her eyes. “I coulda had this all for free?”

It is like she’s suddenly grounded again. “Well, that’s a little presumptuous.”

He leans in so close he’s breathing her in. “Gonna charge me for this?”

“Kissing’s not usually included in—”

“Shut the fuck up,” he interrupts her, attacking her mouth. He lifts her leg, dragging it over his hips while he presses her into the wall. 

“Get a room!” they hear, coming from the stairs. It’s Antonia. Elizabeth squirms against him, embarrassed, tries to push him away. He’s not giving her any leeway though. 

“Fuck off!” he belts back. 

*

He wakes up to Elizabeth singing Happy Birthday to her son. It’s not like he can see her, she’s taken her call to the balcony again. It’s only 6:45, and he groans when he sees those numbers on his lock screen. No time to be alive, especially considering that they didn’t exactly sleep most of the night. 

He's torn from his thoughts when Elizabeth steps back into the room and closes the door. She’s got some kind of cupcake in her hand with two candles on top of it making up the number 10. 

“Do you want a bite of my muffin?” she asks, before realizing her fatal error as a lewd smile creeps onto his face. 

“You suck,” she follows up, sitting down next onto him on the bed. 

He reaches his hand out to her thigh, creeping it up her robe before she swats it away. “So, you wanna talk about it.”

“About what?” she asks, eyes still on her phone. 

“You conning me.”

She sucks in her lip as she finishes up typing (he knows she’s doing that, because she’s a maniac who’s got her typing sounds on). It takes her a long ass time to wrap those replies up, and he’s pretty certain no one will check those before seven. 

“I need the money,” she admits reluctantly, not looking at him. 

“Didn’t know money was tight in the suburbs.”

“Well, I won’t be living there for much longer.” And, right, she told Candy she was moving. He didn’t know if she was just improvising a story or if she was being truthful. With the utmost coercion he gets her to spill on the severity of her situation, house sold that’s mortgaged three times over, being barely eligible for an apartment (she lets out a laugh when he drops the word ‘house’, which isn’t even close to the realm of possibilities), not to mention her divorce costs. 

“Lemme help you.”

“I’m not moving in with you.”

Only Elizabeth could jump to such a dumbass conclusion. 

He sighs and grabs his phone, sends her a contact. “Sonya. My realtor. She’ll set you up.”

She’s clutching her phone, staring at the contact as if she can’t believe this just happened. And he’s fearing she might collapse into a weeping mess for just a second, before: 

“I still need the money,” she sniffles bravely. 

“Don’t worry about it.”

“Why are you doing this? You don’t owe me.”

She’s right, he doesn’t. If anything, she owes him with her lying ass. “Bad for my image. My girl ending up homeless with four kids.”

She snorts. “Your… squeaky clean image?” she asks cheekily, before jumping off the bed and fleeing into the en suite. 

The morning passes in a whirlwind. During a new meeting Rio soon finds out where that muffin had come from. Apparently Elizabeth had baked them from scratch yesterday, and she serves them when they’re having a coffee break. And if she had any hearts left to win over, this definitely did the trick – he’ll never get rid of her. 

As soon as the meeting’s over she drags him aside. “Did you pull some strings?” she blurts, accusingly. He did, yeah, but he’s not going to tell her that. Knows by now she’d be too proud to accept any of Sonya’s suggestions even if they were completely covered in mold. 

“Nah. Just told ‘em someone would call.”

She pushes her phone in his face. “This is perfect.” He knows it is. It’s a two-bedroom, one bathroom, with a large enough kitchen-diner for her to plan it as a loft with a bedroom space for herself. The apartments share a communal garden, nothing just for herself, but there’s a soccer field and a playground. It’s more uptown than she might be looking for, slightly further away from her kids’ schools, but he knows she can afford this. 

He knows she knows he’s lying. 

“So take it,” he says. 

“I can view it on Saturday,” she says. “Do you wanna swing by when we’re going back?”

He’s not entirely sure why she’s asking him. He knows she’s got friends (who may or may know something about the property market), family (the one he’s seen knows at the very base nothing about home décor – but that’s a whole other problem). But she’s super excited about it and, look, he’s only human. “Yeah, cool.”

“Cool.”

*

Grozdan invites him for a private meeting in his study. He’s seated behind a large oak desk, listening to something jazzy on his record player. He motions with his hand to the chair in front of the desk, so Rio takes his place there. After patiently waiting for a few seconds, Rio’s starting to get anxious. His gut already told him this week wasn’t just about talking current affairs, but he sure as hell hopes he hasn’t pulled the short straw on this one. 

“How do you like your stay?” he glows. Rio’s really hoping he doesn’t have to sit through half an hour of small talk before Grozdan cuts to the chase. 

“Yeah, it’s good.”

“Room?”

“Can’t complain.”

“Business is going well, don’t you agree?” And it is, for the most part. 

“We could print much more.”

He chuckles. “Is that so?”

“Yeah, we shouldn’t wash through all those damn kitchen stores. Long drives, tired drivers, too small ‘o batches to make it worth the while. Ain’t efficient.” It’s something that’s been irritating him from the start. “Cops are zoomin’ in on them for the illegal workers. Ain’t good, man.”

“You think we need a new system.”

“I know we do.”

Grozdan’s not letting on too much, but Rio can tell he’s agreeable to his concerns. Doesn’t ask for a new suggestion fortunately, he has some ideas but not exactly a ready-made plan. Maybe if Jay can get his shit together they can use the old system for a while longer, but it just doesn’t sit right with him. Too much risk and too many variables. 

“Your girlfriend,” he starts, pensive look on his face. “Have I met her? She looks familiar.”

There’s something here that makes Rio very reluctant to talk about Elizabeth. It’s useless, of course, Grozdan could find out all about her if he got someone on it. “Yeah, she works for Private Angels. Does take-ins and stuff. Said she met you at one of them parties.”

That answer seems to satisfy him. Rio’s dismissed shortly after. When he exits the room he takes out his phone. Better hit Mick up to see if he has any ideas about washing the cash. Something tells him it’s an issue that’ll be addressed in the next day or so. 

While he’s strolling back to the sitting room he runs into Elizabeth. She’s balancing a tray of tea and cookies in her hands. He’s not even going to bother ask if the baked those herself, she told him she might start stress baking a little because of the apartment (“It’s good-stress baking!” she’d said, rolling out the dough. “Some people go running, this is what I do.” He couldn’t help himself: “Got another idea,” he said, slipping his hand past her waistband into her panties. Elizabeth had pulled away when she heard Marina and Antonia close to the door. He had licked his fingers when the women entered, flushing Elizabeth instantly, “Can’t wait to taste it.”)

“Where are you going?” he asked, getting her attention. 

“I have a meeting. With the girls.”

“Yeah. What’s it about?”

“I can’t tell you.” 

“What? You the secret keeper of the crime wife club now?”

“I’m your crime wife?” she beams, followed by a girlish giggle. 

“Beth!” they hear Zhenya hiss from the conservatory door. 

Elizabeth pecks him chastely on the lips before brushing past him. “I’ll see you later,” she smiles sweetly. He returns her smile before she disappears out of sight. He will find out what that shit’s all about later. 

*

It was their last meal with the whole group. Chaz and Candy were heading out early tomorrow morning, not wanting to leave their businesses unattended too long for the weekend. And he was pretty sure he heard Elizabeth mention that Antonia and Khazanov might leave early tomorrow as well (something about Antonia’s mom flying in from New Mexico – he wasn’t really paying attention. Too busy peppering her back with kisses while he zipped her into her dress). 

Rio isn’t much of a drinker, but even he found himself a bit buzzed when they settled into the lounge after dinner. It’s chilly, but it’s a beautiful evening, most of them have settled outside under the heaters. Rio’s sitting on the couch in front of the fireplace. Elizabeth, barefoot and giddy, sitting on the floor between his legs. “Noo, don’t leave, I want some!” she protested as Jay takes the bottle of bourbon from the coffee table. 

He poured her some more before falling back onto the other end of the couch, slushing his drink. His finger points a few times between Rio and Elizabeth. “How long has this been going on? Never seen you with some,” he halts his sentence when Rio looks at him pointedly, “woman.”

Elizabeth slides her hand on Rio’s knee, relaxing him a bit. “It’s been about four months. Right, honey?” she asks. He hums approvingly. 

“Where’d you meet?” Jay asks. And, has this clown not been paying attention? He’s certain the both of them have told this story plenty of times now. 

“School soccer, you moron,” Candy says, dropping herself into the chair next to Jay, hanging her legs over the armrest. 

“Really? Figured you were covering up for a dirty Tinder hook up or something.”

They both wince. Which, given the actual circumstances, might not be so justified. 

“Please, are you kidding me. When my boys were still playing football, I had to beat all the lonely hearted divorcees off with a stick. No offence,” she adds, when Elizabeth’s mouth drops to the floor, outraged. Rio can barely contain his amusement, seeing her like this over something that didn’t even happen. 

His phone goes off – it’s Cisco, who’s on warehouse duty – it’s not really something he can skip. “Be right back,” he says, and kisses Elizabeth on her crown. Rio goes outside, to the side of the house, out of sight from the guests. “Something cooked?” he asks annoyed. 

“Ain’t even baked, man.”

“How the fuck did that happen?”

“Dunno yet. Driver’s solid though – Theo. Can’t see him turning on us.” Rio doesn’t either, guy needs his ma’s Parkinson medicine way too bad. “Hold on.”

Rio hears Cisco converse with someone else. There’s some crackling on the line before he hears Cisco breathe again. Then it hits him. “It ain’t our money,” Rio says, before Cisco can speak. He doesn’t know what game’s going on, but this is bad. 

“It ain’t our money,” Cisco repeats. 

When he gets back to the lounge there’s not a sign of Jay to be seen, a lot of them have retired to their room already. He searches the hall before being drawn to light coming from the kitchen, especially when he hears what he thinks is Jay’s voice. _”C’mon, hot stuff. Make me feel good, won’t ya.”_

“Get away from me!” Elizabeth screams, before he hears a dull thud, follow by sharp clattering, resonate through the hallways. 

Rio rounds the corner and sees Elizabeth, wet eyed, standing with a broken bottle of bourbon in her hand. Her chest’s heaving as she sees Rio, and quickly rushes over to him as Jay groans and grabs his head. 

“You okay?” he asks. She nods, he can tell she’s not. “Did he touch you?”

She shakes her head, sniffles. “Didn’t let him.” She glances at the broken bottle, still clutched in her hand. 

“You bitch!” Jay groans, pulling himself together as much as his drunk ass can. 

Rio moves into him with lightning speed, grabs his collar and slams him into the fridge. “What you call her?”

Jay reaches his hands out to Rio’s, fumbling to pry them loose. Rio tightens his grip, before pulling him down and tossing him right through the glass table. All the commotion has drawn Chaz and Candy to the kitchen, who rush in to hold Rio back as he’s ready to move in again. His rage is relentlessly pumping through his veins as he struggles against their hold. 

“Get the fuck off me!”

It's like Jay thinks himself invincible. “What do you care, man? She’s just some ho.”

Elizabeth tosses the bottle on the floor and steps towards him, balling her first. Before she can get too close Marina walks into the room, carrying a gun with a silencer. “Step away,” she says, freezing Elizabeth. Making them all back up into the kitchen. 

“This one’s for me.”

*

Elizabeth walks ahead of him into the room and tosses her purse and shoes onto the dresser. “I need to go shower,” she sighs, clicking on one of the nightstand lights, engulfing the room in a warm yellow glow. 

Rio closes the door, still contemplating what just happened. 

“I smell of booze,” she says, sniffing her hair. “And crime,” she follows up, as she turns to him, the left side of her face and neck powdered in red specks. It’s not hers, it’s Jay’s. Marina might not have killed him dead, but he ain’t using that shoulder any time soon. “You should’ve provided some danger pay, wait ‘till the union hears this.”

Rio gets rid of his jacket, hanging it onto the back of one of the chairs. “Thought you wanted to be a part of it.” She might take it as menacing, but he feels mostly sad about it. He takes her hand and she flinches, if only for a millisecond. There is a cut on her hand, probably from when she hit Jay over the head with that bottle. 

“Hit him real good, ma.”

She smiles at him again – proud even. “Lemme take care of it,” he says, nudging her to the bathroom. 

After he seats them on the edge of the bath he cleans the blood of her hand, watching the water flow into the drain, laced with bright red streaks. The cut isn’t too bad, her adrenaline rush must have made the bleeding way worse. If she has any objections against his wound dressing, she’s biting her tongue about it, even if she’s precisely following what he does. The way she lets him handle the cut fills him with a warmth, there’s a trust there that he doesn’t necessarily think he deserves. 

“You should decline that job.”

She pulls back her hand, offended. “Why? Because I want it?”

He jumps up, paces a few times back and forward before, getting back to her. “I ain’t got time to hold your hand through all this,” he says, shaking his head. He’s trying to get her to back down, but judging by her frown that’s not what’s going on in her head. 

It is his hinging on that thought that doesn’t catch up soon enough with her getting up and slapping him hard across the face. “You brought me here!”

Astounded, he turns back his head, rubbing his cheek. His pupils blown by the sight of her, an angry blush spreading across her chest as she retracts her arm to strike again. Only this time he catches her wrist in his hand. In a reflex she goes in with her other hand, but he anticipates on that move, catching that wrist too. He pushes her back against the bathroom wall, wedging his knee between her legs before she can try anything else. 

She’s panting against his lips, chest rapidly falling up and down, pressed against him. And she’s right – that’s the most infuriating. He did bring her here. And she did exactly what he asked of her, not just to everybody else, but to him. Melted into him, mirrored him, ever since their first kiss on the pier. No, maybe even sooner, when they met in his restaurant. 

It's these turmoiled thoughts that his him seeking out her eyes again. “This ain’t Little League.”

“I know,” she breathes. 

“If you take that job there ain’t no getting’ out.”

She’s not looking away, but he sees her sort her thoughts again, until she seemingly settles on her final conclusion. “Maybe I don’t want to get out.”

He subconsciously licks his lips. “What _do_ you want, Elizabeth?”

It's tentative, how exceedingly slow she moves her lips towards his, sucking his bottom one in between hers, lightly biting it before letting it go again with a small sigh. “I’m gonna need payment for that,” she smirks, as if she’s the one in control, as if he’s not pinning her to wall with her hands still wiggling useless in his grasp. 

“That right?” he croaks. He feels her pulse accelerate under the touch of his hands. The air feels heavier between them as he moves impossibly closer. When their eyes meet again, it feels like a dam breaks and he releases her hands, his own immediately grabbing her chin as he attacks her mouth. She flails against him, still stuck with his leg between hers. 

Her mouth feels hot and wet against him, and she opens up for him, demanding more. Keening, she arches her back against the wall, and he reaches his hand out to clumsily pull on the zipper at her back, wrecking it in his impatience. She whines against his mouth, clearly unhappy with his mistreatment of her garment. It merely feeds his amusement, grabbing the top of it and yanking it down until it’s pooling at her waist, exposing her blush pink bra to him. 

Before she has a chance to open her mouth about it he grabs her at the back of her thighs and lifts her against the wall, feels how she immediately circles her legs around him and hooks her hands around his neck. She stills, waiting for his next move as he squeezes the soft flesh in his hands, humming approvingly. 

Her nails drag a trail from the back of his head to his shoulder as she leans into him. Her silky-smooth lips brushing against his ear. “I’ll take some in kind.”

It's embarrassing, but he growls against her neck as he hauls her back into their room. Elizabeth squirming in his arms, delightful giggles falling from her lips into his mouth, filling him with jolts of warmth shooting through his body. 

He’s very close to tripping over the rug, so he tosses her unceremoniously onto the couch, her breasts bouncing as she crashes into the cushions. It’s almost impossible, but he tears his eyes away to get rid of his shoes and socks, kicking them behind him before he makes a fool of himself by tripping again. She watches him with a savage look on her face, wetting her lips as he takes his dress shirt of, tearing one side at the cufflink cuz he hasn’t got any patience for that now. 

Elizabeth starts pushing the dress down, he reaches out too, removing it roughly over her hips and legs in one swift pull. “Leave ‘em on,” he snaps, as he sees her reach out to undo the straps of her heels. She freezes, looking at him with questioning eyes. He lowers himself onto the ground, between her legs. It’s not like he hasn’t been here before, but she instinctively tries squeeze her legs together. 

“Nah,” he says, his hands ghosting over the burning flesh of her thighs, closing slowly in on her center. He feels her eyes on her, her breath hitching as his hands find the fabric of her panties. “Thought you said you was gonna take it.” The silence between them is crudely broken by Rio tearing her panties off, leaving red streaks on her hips. 

“Wasn’t very kind- -“ the last word drowns in her throat as he pushes his mouth directly to the glistering flesh between her thighs, sucking punishing on her clit. The sounds coming from her are carnal, only interrupted as she has sharp moments of breathlessness. He hoists one of her legs over his shoulder, while he pushes the other impossibly far out, opening her completely for him. Instinctively, the sharp point of her heel presses into his back, nudging him tighter against her. 

He’s pulled her low enough for her hands to feel lost, nothing close for purchase aside from their bodies. It doesn’t take long for one of her hands to find the back of his head, he moans into her pussy as she pushes her nails into his scalp. Her flesh heats up more with every lap of his tongue, wetting his face as he moves up to suddenly suck on her clit again. 

It's too much for her and she trashes on the couch, wailing and murmuring his name over and over until it subsides into a wordless sentence. Her hand slides from his head, worn out, as she’s trying to regain her breath, looking at him with an enamored look on her face. “I’ll take it,” she smiles, grasping his chin and dragging him on top of her. It’s a lousy grasp, but he lets her do it, lets her pull him into a sloppy kiss, making her taste how hard she came onto his face. 

His hand finds its way to the clasp of her bra, and he flicks it open with ease, softly pushing the straps from her shoulders. She moves with him to entangle it from her body, giggling into his mouth as it gets stuck in a last remnant of her panties that’s still somewhere around her waist. He quickly rips it off, tossing all the fabric to the floor. His pants and boxers follow soon as well. 

He nudges her onto her back, a direction she follows without protest, making herself comfortable against the cushions. It’s not what he wants yet, and she looks like he fucked her so thorough she’s still lightly catching her breath. He moves into her and straddles her left leg, and throws her right leg around his waist, turning her more on her side. His cock drags over her pussy, making her flinch in a good way, as he bends down to mouth against her breast. He palms her other breast with his hands, squeezing and massaging as he envelopes her nipple into his mouth. He bites onto it, enjoying how she flings herself further into the pillows, nowhere else to go because he’s got her caged with his body. 

Despite her initial reaction, she forcefully grabs him by the neck and drags his mouth back to her nipple again. He finds her eyes, fogged with lust, as she gives him a brief nod before he does it again. And this time it his her pushing her chest into him. He repeats the same treatment to her other tit, also leaving a bright red hickey on the underside. 

He starts to move off her, but she clasps her hand around his wrist, stopping him. “I want…” she starts, searching for the words. “I’m clean,” she adds, her pitch a fragment higher. 

“Me too,” he says. He’s got no headspace to truly reconsider this, just her saying it blowing all smart thoughts right out off his brain. 

“Tell me what you want, Elizabeth,” he drawls, moving back into his position, straddling one leg, while he strokes the leg that’s around his waist. He nudges the head of his dick against her nub, making her shiver underneath him. “Imma need to hear you say it,” he says, almost bored as he searches her eyes. 

“I want you to come inside me,” she bosses him, fearless. He thinks she’ll never stop surprising him. 

He lines up, never losing eyecontact, and he sheathes himself fully into her drenched heath. 

“Oh my god,” Elizabeth babbles, as he starts pulling back, throwing her head back. 

He snaps his hips harsh against her, impaling her impossibly deep in this position. He’s torturing her with his slow pace, but he’s reveling in how hot her walls contract around him. He looks down to where he plunges into her, sees her hand moving to rub her clit in sync with his thrusting. 

He leans forward, picking up his pace as his mouth sucks the delicate skin of her neck. He’s pushing the leg around his waist hard into her belly, but she makes no effort to move. He hears her breath getting uneven, her hand trying to find purchase against his slick back. “Rio, I’m,” he pulls himself from her neck, fully taking her face in as she comes in broken moans. 

Rio leans back again, grabbing her upper leg and throwing it onto his shoulder. He’s not sure if she comes again, or if he’s prolonging her orgasm, as she sucks him impossibly deep into her. He cannot hold it back now, his spine tingling as a violent orgasm splices him in what feels like a white-hot lightening, as he fills her up like she wanted so bad. 

It is just taunting, the moan she reciprocates as he pulls out, falling into a sitting position on the couch. Her ass is still turned halfway up towards him, and he can’t stop himself from slapping it, watching gleefully as it jiggles. 

“You broke me,” she croons, “I’ll never move again.”

Rio chuckles low in his throat. “Gonna leave me to navigate back on my own? Can’t have that.” He grabs a hold of her foot and starts undoing the straps, dropping the shoe to the floor before gathering her other foot into his lap. 

“You’ll be lost without me,” she smiles. When he releases her other foot from its contraption, she strokes his belly with it, trailing the hairs going down from his navel, until he grabs a hold of her. 

“Wanna go round two?”

“Nooo,” she wails. “Not yet.” With the greatest of efforts she gets up from the couch and retreats to the en suite. 

It's late, but there’s a knock on the door. Rio can’t spot his pants among the havoc on the floor, so he catches Elizabeth’s mint green robe from the dresser. Praying it’s not Chaz, he’ll never live that down. When he opens the door Marina’s there, arms folded and leaning against the doorframe. 

He mirrors her as she takes in what he’s wearing, a glimmer of amusement in her eyes. 

“S’all the rage on the East Side,” he replies, dead serious.

“Oh, I bet,” she says, impressed. 

“What are you doing here?”

“I’ve got a business proposition.”

*

It's the last meeting and Rio leans back comfortable in his chair, fingers weaved together as he takes in the room. Jay’s tied to a chair, tries to roll himself to the exit before Chaz reels him in with the rope tied around his waist. “Ho ho, pony.” Jay tries to scream at him through his gag, before falling back, wincing, as he moves his shoulder. It’s not treated with much care, but it’s not bleeding anymore, he’ll easily make it to a hospital. But the wound on his head that Elizabeth gave his bled all over his face and white shirt, making it look a whole lot worse. 

“What the hell is going on here?” Grozdan says, entering the room. 

“Change of plans,” Marina smirks, leaning her arms onto the table. “There’s been a complication in the distribution system,” she adds, eyeing her husband. “Jay would like to start his own business.”

Grozdan circles the table and takes his seat at the head of the table. “Jay, you disappoint me,” he tuts. “What have you got to say for yourself?”

Khazanov removes Jay’s gag. “Bitch is lying, I ain’t done shit.”

“Yeah?” Rio pipes up. “How ‘bout that batch of busted money you send back to mine. Got yourself a goddamn big ego if you think that’s getting past my men.”

Jay is visibly surprised, displaying his failed judgement for all to see. It’s absurd, to see that grown ass man wiggling in his seat, breaking a sweat as he tries to come up with any kind of believable excuse. “You’re nothing without me,” he growls, focused on Marina. “I own half the business.”

Marina finds Rio’s eyes and they both break into an inappropriate fit of laughter. “Nah man,” Rio says, leaning his chin onto his palm. “You don’t own shit. You gonna sign that half of your business over to me, or we gonna get,” he point to Marina, “What did he call ‘em again?”

“Just some ho’s.”

“Yeah, yeah, that’s right. We gonna get some of them to press a bunch of battery charges against you. And worse, probably. That don’t go down well in jail, man.”

“And if you want to keep any of your money when I divorce you, you better sign whatever contract I come up with. Or did you forget about that infidelity clause you put in? That would leave you with nothing.”

“So, if any of you could tell me how this will help _my_ business, that would be great,” Grozdan says, motioning Khazanov to gag Jay again. 

Rio’s all too glad to tell him about that. 

*

“What happened to Jay?” Elizabeth asks, as she gets back into the car after they have reached the mainland. 

“Tied up in Marina’s trunk. Gonna be a long four hours,” he says. He sees her visibly relax in her seat, clutching her handbag in her lap still. And, right, he shouldn’t forget about this. She may have played a part in this, but she probably doesn’t feel like she is. “Dumbass ain’t getting capped because of you.”

“But is he?” she asks, looking at him now. 

Rio shrugs. He doesn’t really care if he does. If Marina had wanted him dead, she’d have done it last night. Maybe she’ll do it after everything is sorted out. “They have a kid together. Don’t think she wants that.”

Elizabeth seems to accept that. 

He starts the car, looking into the rear-view mirror where he can see the estate in the distance of the lake, lightly clouded at the bottom by fog. 

“I didn’t know.”

He eyes her sideways. 

“I just thought she wanted to divorce him. That she needed some ammo for that. I recognized his full name from when I looked for yours on the blacklist. I didn’t know she wanted to take over the business.”

She has no idea how much that solved a bunch of his problems. With Marina on board to move their kitchen stores into Detroit, upping the clientele, selling countertops that had to be imported from all over the world. That opened a whole lot of doors Grozdan was eager to lean into. Bigger batches, more produce. A legit front to invest in. 

“S’Cool,” he said. “Always wanted a kitchen empire.”

“I’m going to need a new one.”

“This you making me pay?” he jokes, eyeing her. Remembering her promise as he carried her across the garden. 

“I think I earned it.”

She did. She really did. 

**TWO WEEKS LATER**

Rio’s enjoying his meal after Marina left their meeting. She’s a pain in the ass, but a hell of a lot better to work with than that dumbass ex of hers. Not in the least because she’s also invested on making the legit side of it work. He’s just finishing his sirloin steak as a familiar frame moves into his line of vision. 

“How’s the apartment going?” he asks, not looking up as she slides next to him into the booth. 

“Good,” she says, grabbing his water glass and fills it with the Sauvignon he has on ice. “Would go faster if someone hadn’t switched out my marble countertop.”

Rio chuckles, looking up as Elizabeth takes a sip of her drink. “Ain’t good for citrus, mama. With all them lemon cakes you cook up. Gonna be begging me for a new one in no time.”

She nourishes her drink in her hand, twirling the liquid around as she contemplates something. Something else. 

“So. What do you wanna talk to me about?”

“Got invited to this party,” she says, offhandedly. 

“That so?”

“Yeah. Was thinking I might need an escort.”

He hums, taking it all in. “You just want some company, or you have any additional _wishes_ in mind?”

She shrugs, eyeing him up and down boldly.

“Nah. You can’t afford those,” he smirks.

“Didn’t think I’d be paying for them either. Was kind of hoping they would come with the deal,” she beams back at him, finishing her drink. Whatever she has on her mind, she reaches out her hand to put it on his chin, turning his head to her. She captures his lips briefly, before pulling back just in the slightest, searching his eyes with her own.

“Yeah. See, kissing isn’t included—” he says merrily. 

“Shut the fuck up,” she smiles. Pulling him into her, kissing him thoroughly now. Yeah, he could get used to this.

**Author's Note:**

> Find me on missmaxime.tumblr.com !


End file.
